'Craftsmen make artefacts they think will appeal to visitors from abroad. Sometimes they get it wrong in a charming way. Creativity is often just mistakes.'

'I love fakes for they make us think about what it is we see in the authentic. About how much of our awe in front of a great historical artefact is in its inherent beauty and how much is to do with its auspicious provenance.'

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The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman runs until the 26th February 2012. (Note that tickets are now near impossible to come by, but don't let that stop you trying - it is as good as the reviews say.)

Tuesday, 14 February 2012

"Innovation doesn't just happen in laboratories by researchers. It happens on the factory floor. The process of making stuff helps you experiment and produce new products. If everything is made in China, people there will gain the skills, knowledge and experience to innovate. And we will be left behind."

Saturday, 11 February 2012

"The communication is a really important part of it, the object doesn't always speak for itself... Although I try to make it as visible as possible; the process used to get to the end result is understandable just by looking at the object... But when you support the physical object with a documentary of how it was made, immediately people can engage with it on a deeper level... understanding how the raw material was transformed in to a functional object."

Thursday, 2 February 2012

Sight Unseen (a blog that shares a similar fascination with products, processes and the people behind them) has an interview with Another Country founder Paul de Zwart. The main topic of conversation is the restrictions caused by a commitment to solely manufacturing in the UK.

Since launching in 2010, Another Country has developed its product range from just furniture, in to a growing range of accessories. However, the growth of the company has forced it to shift the production of certain items abroad, as de Zwart explains:

“We’re still able make to commissions and one-offs in the Dorset workshop — and the materials are sourced from places like Devon, Scotland and Surrey — but in terms of the production items, they’re made in Portugal. We’ve come to realize that it’s very hard to balance provenance and the romantic notion of keeping things close to home when you actually need to have a reliable, sustainable manufacturer who can deliver the goods on time, at a proper price, and at a consistent quality. It had become almost impossible for me to grow the business short of only selling direct to the consumer.”